ABC...More Pasta!

Grace sings her ABCs!

Naptime?

Ummm, apparently Grace can reach the books in the basket next to her crib. I just went in to check on her and this is what I saw....

Birthday Parties

On Saturday, Grace was invited two birthday parties. She had slept all morning and seemed to feel better in the afternoon so we decided to let her go since she had been looking forward to them all week. Everytime she saw the invitations on the refrigerator she said "Allison Party!" or "Tad Party!" depending on which one she was looking at.

Grace's friend Allison, who we know from church, was turning 3 and had her party at Gymboree. Grace has idolized Allison every since she went to her house for the Superbowl party and got to lie on her "big girl bed" so she was excited to receive the invitation to an older kid's party. Gymboree is a gym designed for kids under 5 so it was perfect for Grace. She had a great time playing- especially on the many slides. After the free time in the gym, all the kids had cake and ice cream and sat at their own table. They all thought they were soooo big.

After Allison's party, we went to Tad's first birthday party. Grace was a little tired at the party until the food came out. After dinner, she walked right up to Erin, tapped her on the arm and said "Tad cake?" Apparently she remembered from Allison's party that you have cake at these events. After a lot of cake and ice cream it was time to open gifts. Tad had no interest in the gifts and crawled out of the room. Grace jumped up and started opening the gifts for him. She opened all of them...

Sick Day

Grace's cold is back in full force

So sleepy...

Happy 23rd Month Birthday Grace!

Today is Grace's 23rd month birthday. Since it's the last "month" birthday we'll be acknowledging it's a little sad. After this month, we'll just refer to her in years and half years. No more months. Grace is growing up!
(We'll miss our monthly birthday calls from Nana- thanks for always remembering the 21st of every month!)

Fun with Uncle Craig and Aunt Laura

On Saturday, Craig and Laura came down to Cumming to have dinner with us. Grace took to Craig right away when she realized he was good at playing "horsie." After she rode one foot for a few minutes, she said "next one." Poor Craig worked up quite a sweat with Grace's workout routine.

Grace had the best time with Laura playing on the fireplace. Laura had to help Grace up the step and down the step over and over and over....

Milestone

The purpose of this blog is to keep a journal for our family, primarily for Grace. Yesterday on the way home from the circus- Grace wowed us all with her counting ability. She, for the first time, counted from 1-10 all by herself with her Daddy, her Papa and me as her witnesses. So- Grace, a few days shy of your 23 month birthday, you could count to 10. We are so proud!
(She knows about 60% of her ABCs so look for a report soon on those)

The Circus!

We were all holding our breath about going to the circus after the basketball incident but there was no need- it went great!

We went to Stone Mountain early to play at the playground and have a picnic lunch. Grace had a good time on the slide and deciding whose turn it was to catch her at the bottom.

After lunch we headed to the circus. I picked this circus- there was literally two others going on in Atlanta this weekend- because it was the smallest and promised an actual circus tent. Grace watched and enjoyed the entire thing. The tent was small so everyone had a great seat- including us. The circus was a little different from your average circus but still great. There weren't lions and tigers but lots of great acts and a few animals. If you ask her what she saw, she will tell you "Doggies, Horsies and Balls" which were apparently her favorite acts ("Balls" refers to a very good juggler who juggled 5 soccer balls). The picures aren't great because no flash was allowed but I've included them so you can see what it was like in the tent.

Milkshakes with Papa

We all came to Atlanta this weekend to spend time with Papa. Papa heard that Grace's new favorite food was milkshakes so he brought the blender back from Florida to make Grace a special treat. Grace had a good time making milkshakes with Papa and an even better time drinking them in record time.

Trouble in the backseat

On Friday, Grace had yet another Valentine's Day party. She had a blast playing with all the kids from church and was thrilled when she received another Valentine's bag when she left. It was filled with Valentines and treats. I gave her the bag for the drive home thinking she would like to look at the cards and knowing she couldn't open the candy. I was wrong.... She was caked in chocolate when we got home. I'm still not sure what happened.

Valentine's Day/Terror on the Court

We hope everyone had a great Valentine's Day. Grace and I spent the morning at a Valentine's Day Party at our friends Heidi and Lilli's house. They had several other girls over to play that were Grace's age and we brought Sarah and Anna with us too. Grace enjoyed the playing and the eating....

When we got home, Jack was there between meetings so we were able to give Grace's her Valentine's gifts. Her favorite was her Dora Valentine's Day balloon. She also loved her new book, cars and stickers. She was very proud to give her Daddy the card she colored for him and tell him "Hap Valentine's Day."
Jack has wanted to take Grace to a basketball game since she was born. They watch it on tv together and Grace has learned to say "shoot" and "pass." We have been looking at the local college schedule for months and decided to go to see the Samford Women's Basketball game on Valentine's Day. We figured it wouldn't be crowded and the women's games were cheaper than the men's ;o). We told Grace all week about the basketball game and she was very excited.
When we got to the arena, we learned it was a double header with the women and men and therefore twice the price, but we forged ahead because money was no object in this special night. The game had already started when we walked into the basketball arena at the exact moment the Samford bulldog mascot was walking by. Grace was instantly terrified. And terrified is putting it mildly... It was pure panic. We walked out the door and found another one on the other side where the mascot was not in sight. We went and sat on the second row and had a great view of the game. Grace watched the last 5 minutes of the period tenatively but still gave a few "shoot" and "pass" and even a random "Roll Tide." Unfortuntely our close proximety to the court did not bode well during halftime when the mascot came out on the court. Grace completely lost it. We got up and went to get some consessions to calm her down. She picked a dinner of hotdogs and popcorn and we headed back to our seat. We didn't make it in the door before the screaming started. She was just petrified of that mascot. We ended up sitting in a hallway to eat and calm her down when guess who walked by..... Poor Grace. We've never, ever seen her that scared. Her little heart was pounding so hard and fast. We tried to take her back into the game when the halftime was over but she was just so upset and was literally begging "Peezzz Mommy, home, bye, bye, home." So, after 5 minutes of actual game watching from the first half, we took Grace home. On the way to the car, we asked her if she had fun and she said "yeah, basketball game" and smiled.

Grace looking for the scary dog

Fun Day

On Tuesday, Grace had a fun day. She went to her dance class and had a great time. She liked dancing with the props and especially the parachute. The last few classes when it was pulled out, Grace has let go of her handle and ventured underneath the parachute when it's in the air. She was especially excited on Tuesday. She kept running underneath and giggling uncontrollably.

After dance class, we had a playgroup at Chuck E Cheese. Grace hasn't been since her 1st birthday so it was all new to her. She loved it! They had a slide and play center she spent most of her time in. She also liked watching the show. She loved getting "money" (which was actually left from her birthday party) from Mommy and putting it in the machines. She played a few games and even earned some tickets. I played a few games of skee ball to earn some more tickets so she could get a prize. Everytime I went to throw a ball, there were already two or three on the track. Grace was picking up balls herself and throwing them (like you would throw a baseball) hard at the track. I know some of you are proud of her apparent knowledge and skill when seeing a ball. Oh- and we ate there. Grace and I split a small pizza. "Split" is a generous word for what happened. She had three pieces (smaller than average) and started crying for more which we did not have. She was so upset and even broke out "Peeeeezzzz Mommy, pizzzaaaaa, pizzzzaaa." Luckily we were with our Mom's group and another mom took pity on the starving child and gave her another piece and she.... wanted more! We were able to leave the table with the promise of prizes. We finally had earned our ten tickets to get the stickers that Grace desired. The lady behind the counter thought Grace was cute so somehow we ended up with 5 prizes worth over 100 tickets...

Getting Ready for Valentine's Day

Last night before bed, we all sat down to work on Grace's valentines for her classmates at Mother's Day Out. We weren't really sure if she would understand but she caught on right away. We laid out all the valentines on the floor and told her they were for her friends at school. We asked her to find one for Ava Clare and she picked it up and handed it to us. We let her color it before putting it in the envelope. Then she surprised us by saying "Hunter" and picked up another and started coloring it. Then she said "Holden" and colored another one. She went through her entire class by herself, picking out a different one for each and saying their names.

Her teachers said she had a good time today handing them out to her classmates. She decorated her Valentine's Day bag at school and was excited to bring it home filled with valentines and treats. She was VERY proud of it.

Tonight we made cupcakes for the Valentine's Day party we are going to tomorrow. I told Grace we were going bake and she ran into the kitchen, sat on the floor and pointed in front of her and said "bowl." We haven't done this in a while but apparently she remembers the drill. She had a fun time putting the ingredients in the bowl and stirring. But, she had the most fun decorating....

Birthday Weekend

I had a great birthday weekend. Saturday morning Jack woke up bright and early to kick off our church's habitat project which he organized again this year. Jack had a record number of 60 volunteers to put to work. Grace and I hung out at home and played. Saturday night Jack and Grace took me out to dinner at Johnny Rockets. Grace loved the french fries! but they weren't her favorite. She's never had a milkshake so Jack gave her a try of his. She took a sip and beamed and asked for more "ice cream." I wish we had brought our camera to take a picture of her and Jack sipping at the same time from their respective straws and then later, Grace drinking from both straws at the same time. She completely assumed the milkshake and drank almost the entire thing.
After dinner we went to Pottery Barn to visit a friend. As we got out of the car, Grace looked up and started yelling "moon! moon! hi moon!" It was the first time she spotted it by herself outside of her books. As we walked closer to the store, the moon disappeared behind the building. This was very upsetting to Grace "Uh oh, moon, moon, where moon? Bye bye moon." It was very cute.
On Sunday, Grace was very generous with her "Hap Birthday Mommy" which was repeated throughout the day and even sang a little of the song on her own. Stephanie and Jessica came over to watch Grace so Jack and I could go to the movies and out to dinner. We had a great time going out by ourselves.

Friday

Friday was the last day of our snow journey. We woke up early and went to see Grandma Trish before we left. After that, we went to Uncle Mike and Aunt Sandy's house on our way to the airport. We had a nice visit with them before heading out of town. Michelle's college friend Dan meant us at the airport for lunch. Grace made it through security without incident (she even received some stickers from the security people) and was excited to learn that the Milwaukee airport has a play center for toddlers. There was no one there so she had the place to herself to run and play.

We boarded the plane to sit next to another business man not happy to see us- especially when a bag of cheerios was spilled in his lap. Grace did ok and actually slept most of the way. She was sweaty and heavy but quiet...

As soon as we got off the plane in the Atlanta airport, Grace started a "french fry!" chant. We had a long layover so we got some dinner, french fries included, and found a seat by the window between concourses so Grace watched "Airplanes!" for about an hour. She was so excited everytime they went by the window. I set Grace up with Clifford for the remaining hour where she entertained everyone that walked by with her mouth hanging open and blank stare at the computer screen. About a dozen people stopped to watch her.

We had a good flight from Atlanta to B'ham. We sat next to a nice mom who didn't mind the animal crackers spilled in her lap. Grace was very excited to see her Daddy who was waiting for us at the airport.

I posted the rest of the pictures from the trip on Grace's photo website- www.kodakgallery.com/gracecarney

Thursday

Thursday was a busy day. We went to see Grandma Trish first thing since we had missed her the day before. We all had a great time visiting and watching the live bird display that was near her room. Grace even helped out by pushing Grandma Trish's wheelchair down the hall.

Uncle Pat and Aunt Tina joined us for lunch where we all watched Grandma Trish eat a rare steak with her bare hands! The nice aids at the nursing home brought us dessert and Grace was very excited about the "Cake!" We left mid-afternoon when we realized we had worn Grandma Trish out because she was too tired to go to the 2pm! happy hour.

We spent the afternoon with Pat and Tina back at Stan and Linda's house. Pat gave Grace her first caramel candy which she liked until she realized she couldn't chew it and promtly spit it out into Nana's hand.

We had a great dinner with Stan, Linda, Kelly, Ryan and Leah. Linda even had a birthday cake for me. Grace warmed up right away to her second cousins and had them reading books to her right away. She would grab a book and just plop herself into their lap!

Wednesday- Snow Day

On Wednesday, Wisconsin had its worst snowstorm in 10 years and we were stuck. We had to abandon all plans and spend the day at Stan and Linda's house. We spent 10 minutes getting Grace dressed to go outside and she lasted about 30 seconds before she said "bye bye snow." It was blowing pretty hard and she didn't like it hitting her face. We tried to get her to pick it up but she quickly brushed it off.

Grace played with Isabella all day and had a great time reading books and planning with Nana. She also enjoyed looking out the window at the snow.

The highlight of Grace's day was eating her first ice cream bar

Tuesday

On Tuesday, Grace and I started our trip to Wisconsin to see our relatives. Our trip started out shaky when Grace was not happy with the security people at the airport who wanted Grace to take off her shoes to go through the metal detector. After a few minutes she calmed down and and was ready again to "ride airplane." The first flight was quick to Atlanta which was good because we sat on the runway for awhile. The plane was small and the man next to us wasn't as thrilled with seeing Grace as the rest of us are. We did have a little breakdown when Grace saw her Clifford DVD in our bag. She started yelling "Watch Big Dog! Big Dog! Big Dog!" at the top of her lungs. I was finally able to distract her with some books. We had an hour layover and were able to get "french fries!" for lunch before we got on the next plane. Thank goodness the flight to Wisconsin wasn't full so Grace had her own seat. She thought she was such a big girl. She quickly buckled in and grabbed the Skymall to look through (she does have a birthday coming up soon). She had her animal crackers and water so she was all set. She also loved having her own window and looked out it often.

After Grace was finished with her catalog, we set up the laptop with some headphones so she could watch "Big Dog."

We met Sarah, Isabella and Nana at the Milwaukee airport and started our Wisconsin vacation. We went to Stan and Linda's house to say hello and leave our suitcases before we went to Don and Sheila's for dinner. Grandma Trish also joined us for dinner. Grace was excited to see her "Grandma Tish." We had a good Mardi Gras dinner with everyone including Bart and Teresa (who Grace loved playing with). Grace liked the King Cake Shelia had gotten us for dessert. It had started to snow during the afternoon so we left right after dinner so we wouldn't get stuck out in the cold weather and went back to Stan and Lindas.

Mardi Gras Weekend

Last weekend, Michelle went with Stephanie and Jessica to Mobile to celebrate Mardi Gras for Stephanie's 30th birthday. As you can see from earlier posts, Jack watched Grace at home. The girls had a great time at the home of Mardi Gras watching parades, eating too much and hanging out. Stephanie spent the weekend figuring out her birthday clues and completing tasks to earn prizes. They were able to have a great place to stay thanks to Melissa.

As you can see- Grace loved her presents from Mardi Gras!